The Awakening of the Gods (Forgotten Ones)

by M. H. Hawkins

  Mea huffed, jumping back a few feet, and unsheathed the swords she just put away. Damn it. I forgot about the giant paw. Mea steadied her nerves for whatever might be coming next, the owner of the giant feline paws.

  The beast struggled to put itself out of the hole, and its paw slapped down again. this time its nails came with it, and they dug into the dirt.

  A lava-covered face followed the giant paws out of the pit. The beast’s face was the size of a titan as it slowly rose out of the pit. Covered in lava, the fiery liquid slowly dipped of the creature’s face. Behind it, a massive pair of wings peaked out behind it. A giant lion’s body followed, emerging and revealing more of the creature. Finally it had completely made it out of the pit, and the beast gingerly stepped around the pit while it looked around suspiciously. Like a dog caught in the rain, the creature revved itself up and got ready to shake. Then it did, shaking of the slobbery strands of liquid fire and finally revealed itself. The Sphinx. It had the body of a lion with the golden-brown wings of a hawk attached to its back. Its face and upper torso were that of a woman’s. Though unclothed, her body was covered in the same golden-brown fur of a lioness and, just like the rest of her, covered her chest with a thick layer of golden-orange fur. “Close the door and stop the Whore?” quipped the Sphinx, grinning. “But earth is the realm for those that fell.”

  Mea turned a listening ear to the rhyming sphinx. The Whore? Taking a second to remember, Mea realized that she was talking about Lilith, Lilly, the Whore of Babylon—a title that Lilly hated with a passion.

  Mea remembered the Sphinx as well. Partly from childhood stories and partly from reading the books in heaven, she was somewhat familiar with the beast—at least she thought she was. The Sphinx was a mythical creature—a guardian of sorts—that asked riddles and required answers before it allowed anyone to pass into or through its domain. For those not clever enough to unravel her riddle, death’s journey was the only passage that they would receive. Anyways that was what Mea had read about the creature. Mea gave the beast a sideways look and said, “So you’re the Sphinx? You’re the legendary Sphinx, the ones from all the legends? And now… here you are, trying to escape from hell. Why shouldn’t I kill you?”

  The Sphinx started to answer but was cut short. Mea snapped, “And no more riddles.”

  The Sphinx lowered its massive head then said, “As you command, Ishtar.”

  Ishtar. That was Mea’s old name, the one from Ancient Sumer, from a past life that she no longer remembered nor cared to—a fleeting memory that no longer concerned her. “Don’t call me that,” Mea huffed. “That’s not my name, not anymore.”

  “It was, once, at one time…. But you are correct though—at least in one aspect. That was certainly long time ago. And now, perhaps I should call you the Fallen Lion.”

  The title was odd to her ears. The Fallen Lion? That didn’t sound like a complement nor did it sound like the noblest of titles. But Mea let it pass without questioning it. “What are you doing here?”

  “The stone tower has new leadership. Lilith. I chose not to be a part of her… rebellion. So I left. And now… now I am here. I helped you with Lilith’s minions, but if you wish to go ahead and execute me, if that is what you desire, don’t let me estop you. But before you do, please know that my words have wisdom and my answers have value… but nothing is free.”

  The Sphinx was being particularly odd and docile, but Mea’s swords were still out and ready. “Alright,’ said Mea, “I’ll bite. What is this price of yours? What is the price for your wise words?” Hopefully they’re more useful than my trip to the afterlife was, Mea thought.

  Sitting on her hind legs, the giant Sphinx sighed then began licking its paw and rubbing it across its face, cleaning itself like a common house cat. “My price? Life, what all people desire, the same thing that everyone wants, to live.”

  “Life? That’s it. You see life as such an insignificant payment.”

  The giant Sphinx lied down and sighed. “I just want to go home. It’s been so long. And now… It is the End of Days, and life is much cheaper than it was, cheaper than it’s ever been.”

  “We’ll see about that. Why were you condemned to hell anyways?”

  The Sphinx sighed then stood up. Tapping its paws on the ground in short, choppy steps, it arched its back, stretched out its front legs, then its hind ones, and then it began shrinking. The Sphinx’s lioness body shrank down as she stepped towards Mea. Her short mane of golden-brown fur folded in, shrank, then became light-brown dress that was fairly form fitting but covered most of her. Her Large golden-brown wings folded over her shoulder, thinned, and became loose and had a glossy sheen to it as it hung over her shoulders. Her wings had become a shawl—thin and beautiful; it was the color of dark-chocolate. Her hair darkened to jet-black, and her skin-tone became a dark shade of almond.

  The Sphinx let out a heavy sigh and prepared to tell her story. “Like you, I was once a god—not as strong as you are, not one of the First Seven—but a god nonetheless. It was a long time ago, in Egypt. I would walk amongst the mortals as we once did—as we all did, at one time. After some wandering, I chose to settle down in Egypt and to serve their pharaohs and queens, as a guardian of sorts. The pharaohs were not always just, but they kept order, and I counseled them. If they strayed too far from fairness, I was still able to reason with them, most of the time. Still… my counsel was not always heeded.”

  “What happened?” Mea sheathed her blades.

  Tears welled up in the Sphinx’s eyes. “One pharaoh, he was a proud man. Too proud. And when his queen became pregnant with child, and when she gave birth… The child was light-skinned and… he knew. Almost instantly he knew that the baby was not his. You see, his queen had lain with a slave, a house-slave. Still, out of… fear, loyalty, or pride; the pharaoh stayed quiet about it and never mentioned it to anyone—not even his queen. Still I knew; I could tell. And I knew that he knew. I could see it in his eyes. I pleaded—I begged him—to offer forgiveness to his queen and to raise the child as his own. And he agreed, but one day… I left the palace to walk along the Nile as I often did. And he…”

  “He killed them?”

  The Sphinx nodded. “The queen and the child. An innocent little girl. No more than seven-years-old…” The Sphinx smiled as she reminisced about the child. “She was a sweet girl. Beautiful. Hopeful. Smart. Royal blood or not, she would have made a fair and just queen but… I just, I just didn’t understand. Why?”

  The Sphinx pursed her lips tightly in anger, and her hand folded into a clenched fist. “So I killed them, all of them. Royal blood or not, I killed them. Slave, royalty, my rage found no difference between the two. Any mortal that did not flee or flee fast enough, I killed them.” Reliving the pain filled memory, the Sphinx’s brow was narrowed, and she was shaking her head back-and-forth while tears dripped down her cheeks. “That little girl… They took the one thing that mattered to me—so I took everything from them. I snuffed out their precious royal bloodlines and wiped away their beloved dynasties from the pages of history. I burned down their libraries of papyrus scrolls that had their history and names removed from them, removed from existence. I turned their fertile grounds to dust and buried their monuments in sand and despair.”

  The Sphinx snorted and grinned. “And after that, I… I became the creature you just saw, the Sphinx of legend. And I continued the roam the lands. And the riddle they all speak of, the one they all say that I asked. That was true. I did ask a riddle. I asked it to everyone that crossed my path. And I killed everyone that could not answer it, and no one ever could.”

  The riddle? There were so many stories about the Sphinx and her riddles. But all the stories seemed to contain completely different riddles. But now, the Sphinx herself was saying that there was only one riddle. Mea asked, “What was it? What was the riddle?”

  “The riddle?” The Sphinx blinked a few times, and a few more tears fell down her cheeks. “The riddle was… Why? Why would anyon
e kill an innocent child? That little girl never hurt anyone… and they killed her… because her blood wasn’t pure. What did it matter what kind of blood ran through her veins? Did she have any control over it? No.”

  Mea couldn’t help but to think of her little brother Ryan, the one that she was too cowardly to walk across the street to see again. Mea mumbled, “I’m sorry.”

  The Sphinx forced a smile and nodded sadly. “But eventually I left Egypt. I exiled myself from my home. And I settled in Greece and found a new master, in the form of a king.” Her face turned sad again and her voice cracked as she spoke. “He wasn’t always unjust. He started out with good intentions, to protect his people. But then… Over time, the more blood that was spilled, the blurrier the line became. Eventually the blood of Greeks and Persians became no different. Blood was blood, regardless who it came from. Despite all the bloodshed and regret, I remained loyal. I followed orders. I thought my loyalty would make up for all my killing. But the Greek king’s orders weren’t always just, and following orders does not admonish one from the atrocities they commit. So when the Dark One came for me, I went willingly.”

  The Sphinx sighed. “But I have paid my penance. As you know, time inside the stone tower, outside this realm… it blurs. And time offers understanding, and it offers regret and reform, if you allow it to.”

  “And?”

  “I am not the same as I was. And the stone tower is not the same as it was. Lilith—Lilly—and her banshees, they have consumed them—all of the them… almost all of them; and they would have consumed me, but I fought and I ran.” She slid up the sleeve of her tan dress and showed Mea her forearm. “And it was not without great effort.”

  The Sphinx presented her naked arm so Mea could inspect it. Long puffy scars streaked across the inside of it. Other scars crossed over the back and made disfigured X’s up her arm and continued up past her elbow, and Mea figured that the rest of the Sphinx’s body was covered with similar scars.

  Mea asked, “What is this information you have?”

  “The outcasts from above, the ones that now walk the earth, they are coming for your family, as retribution for their exile. In the stone tower, even amidst all the screams and through the chaos, I heard Lilly’s banshees whispering about it, repeating what they had heard from the fallen… that they were coming for your new family, your mortal one. ‘Take from her what she took from us,’ they whispered, repeating the outcasts they’d heard. Although—to be true and honest, and with complete information—I do not know if Lilith was the one who gave the order. Perhaps some of her banshees just went rogue—or the fallen have found a new leader.”

  The news hit Mea hard and her mouth dropped and hung open limply. The gods were not omniscient, her least of all. She found herself suddenly regretting not going home when she had the chance. Forty feet away, a one-minute walk; that was all it would have taken. They’re coming for my family. The thought led to another thought that twisted inside her and tore at her stomach. What if I’m too late?

  Rogue, she said rogue? Mea fought against her emotions and tried to stay rationality. I need information, before I go, she realized. I need to know what I’m dealing with. “Why? How could a banshee go rogue?”

  The Sphinx shrugged. “They got what they sought from Lilith—power, gods’ blood, blood from the monsters that were imprisoned in the stone tower. Why would they go rogue? Those newly gifted with power tend to feel emboldened and powerful,” the Sphinx quipped. “And sometimes they rise up against those that once controlled them. Power is both a gift and a curse; a sweet wine drank to the point of sickness. To the young, youthful power is both innovative and brash—just as experience brings wisdom, and with that experience, stubborn rigidness comes shortly after.”

  Mea nodded then jabbed her chin to the side of her. “Go.”

  The Sphinx sucked on her bottom lip and seemed reluctant to leave. “In ancient times the gods required a sacrifice.” She stepped forward and began removing her shawl—her wings. “To give thanks and with selflessness, I offer—”

  “Keep them,” Mea said, putting her hand on top of the Sphinx’s and stopping her from removing her shawl. “I’ve taken enough wings in my lifetime. I don’t plan on taking yours—yours or anyone else’s for that matter.”

  “You are kind and merciful.” The Sphinx patted Mea on the shoulder and stepped past her. Pausing momentarily, she then said, “Mea, at one time or another, we all become monsters. Sometimes it is necessary, but it is not always necessary. I hope you fare better than I had.”

  The words were empty inside Mea’s ears, replaced by a darker, much more ominous thought. I should kill her.

  Though Mea was fixated on the pool of lava—the gateway to hell, she lingered on the thought and seriously was thinking about going after the Sphinx and killing her. Better safe than sorry, she thought, but backstabbers always go first. I’m not a backstabber. Mea switched gears and let it go. Now thinking about her family as well as the end of the world, Mea asked, “How do I stop it?”

  “How do you stop the end, the Cleansing?” The Sphinx huffed. “Death pays for life, and life ends in death. And with each passing day, life steps closer to death and onto the inevitable eternity. How do you stop the Cleansing? That is one riddle I do not know the answer to.”

  Human yet still cat-like, the Sphinx leapt onto the dry dirt wall and bounced up it with ease, escaping into the Gobi Desert without looking back.

  Mea had other concerns. She still had a gate to close. Watching the heatwaves rise from the lava, she curled her hand into a fist.

  After a deep breath and a long exhale, her breath was steaming again.

  Mea squeezed her fist a little tighter, until it turned icy blue and a cold, and a cloudy fog steamed around Fist. Focusing on it, the frosted aura growing around her grew stronger, colder; and beneath her elegant silver armor, the stringy muscles within her lanky forearm were flexed and squeezing itself just as hard and tightly as it could.

  It exploded. Her fist opened, and her fingers out—like angry tentacles, and a sub-zero blast shot out of her palm and into the lava pit.

  A cracking sound followed, and the pit froze instantly. The pit of boiling melted rocks turned to a cloudy, ice-covered brick. Mea stepped over to the edge of the now-frozen pit and looked into it. And looking down and into the gateway to hell, she saw the brigades of banshees—they were as still as statues, catatonic, and now frozen in the once-open gateway. And the thousand tattered black dresses of the thousand pale, beautiful banshees filled the long winding tunnel that the led into and out of hell. Deeper within the tunnel—less cloudy yet frozen all the same—the lava that crisped the tunnel’s edges glinted red like crimson rubies and lit up the tunnel in subtle, glowing red light the same brightness and color of a a photographer’s darkroom.

  The frozen banshees? Paralyzed in eerie action poses, they looked as if they were swimming, as if they were escaping a sinking ship. But all the same, they were still most certainly frozen. Their eyes weren’t, and they seemed to following any and every one passed by them. Mea curiously looked at them, examining the banshees. She saw their icy blue-black irises darting back-and-forth and all-around. Second-guessing herself, Mea wasn’t sure if it was real. But when one of the banshees blinked and the rest of them blinked at her in unison, and when they all starting to stare at her, Mea had her answer… and all the same, she was relatively unimpressed.

  Mea huffed then stepped back onto the rocky earth that surrounded the now-frozen ice pit. “Six down. One to go,” she muttered to herself. She looked up at the heavens and took a moment to enjoy the stars. Her mother taught her that. “Mea, always take a moment to look up at the stars and smile at ‘em, whenever you can,” her mother used to say. “It helps,” Diana always told her. Stars help with what? was always the question that followed. To which Diana would reply, “Everything! The stars help with everything.” The memory made Mea smile. Then, in a pillar of light, she blasted off, into the sky and in to
the heavens.

  CH 9: Right Hand Man

  The sound of clashing metal filled the air, and razor-sharp edges were grinding against each other. Their blades kissed, and sparks flew and flashed across the polished walls of the cavern and gave life to the dashing shadows.

  Growling and howls followed, ringing out from the multitude of bouncing wolves inside the cavern and echoing through it. It sounded like a thousand angry sled dogs in Time Square on New Year’s Eve.

  Fenrir’s glaive sparked against Darius’s spear before a hard thump sent the spear sliding across the floor, bouncing off Fenrir’s throne, and skidding into a granite corner. Fenrir flung his glaive aside and grabbed Darius by the neck.

  Pulling the young god’s face close to his own, Fenrir snarled and said, “Mind your weapon, and mind your words.”

  Not taking the Fenrir’s guidance, Darius snorted. “Maybe you are the one that should mind your—“

  Fenrir’s squeezing hand choked the words out of Darius’s throat and sharply interrupted him. Darius’s anger took a backseat, and he found himself suddenly swinging around, and his face was racing towards the armrest of Fenrir’s giant stone throne. Darius’s face smashed into the polished marble armrest, and the impact rippled through Darius’s cheeks, and he couldn’t do much but swallow his words and his anger. Like Darius’s face, the hammered armrest exploding, and broken marble splashed across the throne room floor.

  Fenrir followed up by spinning Darius around and slinging his half-limp body into the back wall of the throne room. And with a weak grunt, Darius splattered against the wall, and pain exploded through his body. The back of his head slammed against the wall, and flashes of black and silver filled his jiggling vision. Darius fell, collapsing into a puddle on the ground.

  “Calm!” Fenrir shouted, “down!” The wolf-god’s face was serious, and any note of prior tenderness was gone. “You, Darius,” Fenrir barked. “You would challenge me? Two days after ceremony?”