my mother,
my confidante,
my only friend,
was now trulygone.
‘What Will I Do Now?’
I begged her to give me answers that a part of me knew she could not possibly have. But grief was a cruel, selfish thing. It wounded the one who carried it so deeply, that when others saw them, they only saw the wound. And that was all I was now. A wound. A motherless thing. A child grieving without even knowing what grief was. The question hung in the air. Styx simply held me in her cold arms, her wet hair against my body, but in my numbness I could not even feel the cold. She did not say a word; instead, just let me sob. For how was Styx to know how to comfort a child who had lost the only parent they had ever known? We sat like that for hours, her holding me close, this dreaded river that even the Gods were afraid of tenderly consoling a grieving child. Finally, when my tears had stopped from exhaustion, I heard her say, ‘I promised your mother I would keep you safe, Hekate.’
From the Shadows, a Figure Spoke
‘You cannot keep a God-child
from above here among
the corpses and cold, Styx.
She needs a home. A place to grow.’
This voice was unfamiliar
and it had the agedness of oceans.
When I squinted to look at the figure,
it looked like a mountain was moving.
I realized then that a giant was crouching
in the mouth of the entrance of this place.
His huge form began to slowly shrink
until he was the size of Charon.
‘I know this, Pallas,’ Styx snapped,
‘What would you have me do precisely?
You know the river is my only home.
You have known this since we became consorts.’
Ah. So this was my uncle Pallas,
my father’s only brother. My mother mentioned
his name just once, when reading
a message from my father.
The words had not made sense
to me then. But now,
in the cold light of afters,
