The Pantheon

As faces turned in the misty snowfall, it was clear to me no man was eager to follow my stride here, but hope was finally gleaming in the hollow eyes of some. There was a wistfulness about the air and it held heavy and unwavering. These men had little protest to my leadership, but it seemed the cold wanted to challenge me. A chill arose over my body before crashing down my spine in the form of some brutal shivering fit. That horrible dread now lurking within my head wasn’t related to the icy crystal fragments hanging from the dead tree branches, or the occasional breeze that shattered men’s souls. It was this place. The building drew near; a pile of grey on an ivory canvas. It was clear our suffering had amounted to shelter from the cold, but a haven with no salvation was not a haven at all.

“We escaped the wolves narrowly, and yet you still have the courage to lead us to a place like this? A den served to beasts on a silver platter? And in this weather, what don’t you expect to be dwelling within?” the voice scoffed from ahead of me, but the snowfall dismissed my glimpses of the speaker.

I was slowly shaking my head when all of the sudden, from the ground, came tall jutting stones that only a heartbeat before had been shrouded in fog. Men stopped when faced with the monoliths, their faces wore uncertainty almost like they had been confronted concerning their grim affairs in this wasteland. Others carried on, unphased, scarves and vapor trailing their heads as breath came slowly to combat the freezing air. My breath came sharp and my body seemed to exhale the same temperatures as the air. It was a losing battle, we were chilled to our very cores. I caught my eyes gazing upon the rock that had found itself before my stride. Smooth and tainted with streaks of white, it was carved in what appeared to be writing of an ancient past unknown to the likes of our history, yet on second glance more closely resembled symbols or patterns rather than a foreign script.

That pile of bricks that drew ever closer and had once only been sought as a place of refuge in my mind had become a great majesty when I was truly faced with its presence. The bricks were carved akin to the architecture of the obelisks but unlike them, they seemed to be untouched by the natural ferocities of the current world. In their almost pristine being, they gave me the feeling that this sanctuary was deeply rooted in this world.

Through a shattered wall I crept into the contained cold of the new environment, my limbs stiff and burning in torment far beyond what any hitchhiker would experience in his lifetime. The room was masked in its own shadow, but the blur of the outside world guided me. From within, my hands landed on great doors, rough and splintery, and I watched as they yawned open. I scanned the faces of my party to ensure they would accept the temporary safety that the structure before them offered.

Not yet barren from snow, men still found it necessary to topple over into a complete collapse on the floors. Others began to kick up the snow in hopes of finding floorboards to burrow themselves under. I braced for the temperatures these stones had been storing over time, and let my numb hands scale the walls, feeling the crevices, but to my surprise, the piercing cold reception of skin to anything here was nonexistent. Unfortunately, that wasn’t to say it was exactly warm to the touch. I was faithful that I wasn’t the only one whose will was not staggered by the violence of the frigid and blistering journey. We would need more than faith, and with heads on the floor turning paler, survival was doubtful at best. 

If we had been naive enough to bring the women of our group into this larger-than-life blizzard, there would surely be stern disapproval directed accusingly at our exhausted behavior, though I was sure fatigued minds would welcome it. My wandering thoughts brought a splash of internal laughter to me, but my morale was least important of all. I was personally sarcastic in my hope that the others were finding comedic means by which to entertain themselves.

With my scarf spiraling from my neck to my forehead and spilling over my shoulders, I began to trudge through the powder on the ground, deeper into the cavernous building. Occasionally the bricks of my path were illustrated in the light cast by broken walls, and I had not gotten far into the darkness when my vision strayed out into the hazy light itself and astonishment began to glisten clear in my eyes. Nothing had prepared the mental state of my mind for such a heavenly save such as this.

As water transcended its icy encasement, snowflakes bled into rainfall, washing the world in silver puddles resting on the bed of the thawing white cover. A chorus of raindrops burning through the freezing blanket echoed throughout the chamber, reduced to a peaceful padding sound as I instinctively closed my eyes to focus and clear my mind of the once descending thoughts. I was feeling some release from the stress that had been burdening me. From up above, not sleet to pummel us or hail to break us, but simply liquid form rain cascading from the skies coming to cleanse the world of the harsh snowfall. A clash of natural elements, both hailing from the behemoth overcast. I watched as my group was immersed in the dripping cloudburst, wide-eyed as that which was eternally falling from the sky heartbeats ago dissolved and transformed the landscape in its wake.

Hurriedly, I made my way out and into the open, sloshing through the wet arctic world, grabbing their backs and shepherding those who were gazing up in wonder inside before they froze to death on their own accord. Puddles jumped up at surrendering men as their footsteps led them stomping among the pools in escape.

Eyes coordinated in their worry, I clutched the arm of a youthful figure to my side before he lost his balance and we both slid hard into the layer of slush guarding the frozen solid earth. I knew him as Loryn, but he may as well have been as good as dead face-first in the ground like that.

“In! In! In!” my words were surely drowned out by the whistling northern winds, even to the ears of Loryn just in front of me. As he stood, I could only hope he’d follow and with that, darted to reluctantly accept my own advice and take cover, skidding into the stone brick as my feet ran me into the shelter administered by the building.

The rain began to make its way seeping down the carvings of the bricks, making streams on the floor patterns and waterfalls on the wall patterns. I hadn’t known waterfalls to ever fall sideways, but flowing beyond the bounds of my comparison rapidly was the rainfall that had been accumulated in the maze of indents. My body swiveled separate from my feet, which were now grounded to the floor in shock, and the abrupt image of every grey wall entirely lined with crystalline liquid flashed before my eyes. Gasps from many men rang in unison throughout the room. We could have been told this whole place was a map of every great waterway, down to the tiniest creek, and we would have been none the wiser. It was like nothing I’d ever seen before, nor I’d thought to experience. Loryn took up stride with the mystical happening, following the direction of the water current into the darkness.

Come back! The words hung on my tongue. With a sigh, I stared intently down the passageway for several moments.

The clear, yet illuminated fluid running through the architecture appeared to be following me and leading me in its movement at the same time as I walked after him. I couldn’t see him in front of me, I only knew that the structure must reach deep into the heart of this boreal forest and if I wanted to persist in finding him, I would be on the tireless move for an unknown amount of time. I strolled alongside the glow that was peculiarly emanating from water canals vested in the walls, and with my mind only concerned with the hope to find safety for my followers… and this young, starving fellow ahead of me, I continued alone, paying no attentive focus to the defiant physics I was witnessing in play. Perhaps the icy claw in my stomach rattled my senses far beyond recovery, or maybe the cold finally breached my skull and numbed my brain into stupidity. Whatever it was, the feeling that we shouldn’t be here was stirring uneasily.

Echos of undefinable sounds began to shrink the impacts of splattering rain.

“Don’t push your luck,” my words to Loryn existed without an answer.

Strange calls and hushed noises bounded through the one large corridor I was trotting, entering my ears alarmingly more frequently as I progressed. The water coursing through the walls almost gave me a sense of comfort against the unsettling shrieks that were beginning to appear in my mind and causing me to think. Maybe Corwin had been right in his warning about this place, there could be anything lurking beyond the reach of sight. Could be wolves, could be worse. Whatever it was, if it existed, Loryn was walking in its direction. I didn’t understand nor could I do too much thinking as my legs were involuntarily leading me deeper. 

This was once so familiar, a pantheon that graced that land upon its founding and flourished in the fountain of gratitude. Now it has been marked as taboo by those capable of doing so. I had visited these exalted memories in the past after the banishment of travel into these walls was conducted, but I had never seen anything but my own sorrow—until now—until we were caught dead in a snowstorm being hunted by our paranoia—poor decisions—until it rained.

The trance that my footsteps followed broke, leaving me standing before a solemn archway. I was brought into the presence of a tomb, and as I took the initiative to enter, I could feel thoughts in the back of my mind that were perceiving what my eyes saw and translating it back to me as dangerous. I held respect in my pace as I left the guidance of the streaming water about the pantheon. I could hear its flow peacefully onlooking from every direction, and it seemed to be growing quieter as I approached. An eerie sigil marked a rectangular altar, it too was flooded with the delicate rainfall. Central to the shapeless room I had found myself in, I gazed upon it in the dark. I was of no recollection as to whose accommodation this shrine was dedicated to. My mind was almost empty, only bearing the sole thoughts of my company. I had brought them here, and then I had disappeared on them, but it remained feeling as if there was no need for remorse.

The currents coursing through the walls began to shimmer until they brightened, their radiance in the dim room blinding. Tears fell because my eyes were watering, not used to such brightness as the light glared all around me, the patterns blurring together and consuming the room in an unpigmented glow. In a flash, I saw Loryn standing opposite me, behind the centerpiece of the tomb.

“I don’t understand,” I said with dwindling patience about my tone.

“What?”

“Why would you come here?”

We were sitting in the shadows of the embrowned room once again, his form silhouetted against the magical clear lines of illumination as he shook his head, “I’m not sure.”

My hands were set on the altar and I leaned into them. I was lost in contempt at myself as his answer swirled around in my head. I let my voice steep in anger before I unleashed it in the small crypt, “You can’t go walking off into the unknown. The unknown is the most dangerous thing I’ve ever come to know. We left the group, and any number of troubles could bear down on them or us at any moment. Sickness, predators, desertion,” I could feel his gaze probing me and I knew he was struggling to grasp a foothold of apology.

The strangest feeling piled onto me and I stared through slit eyes as a mist began to gather atop the altar, the moist particles frolicking between my fingers and cementing around my fingertips. I backed away when sounds crept around me, stemming from the sigil.

As if a manifestation of my wildest dreams, a picture of my cherished past reared its head. An apparition standing before us, its features like that of a vivid dream, its movement stilling the walls of water, its presence mimicking that of a great lord, yet it was nothing of the sort. I gazed with uncontained intent, it was as if I couldn’t keep my eyes still as the dripping, misty collection of microscopic water droplets formed a person before my very self. It was fractured but complete at the same time, a mystical depiction riding the likeness of my grandfather. I had now recalled everything of the greatness that was dwelling in this pantheon.

The magic spoke like it wasn’t the essence of something we couldn’t possibly comprehend, and Loryn scarcely breathed as the form of a hand passed through me. It appeared to be stationary at first, maybe even an illusion, but I could clearly feel the difference when it touched me.

“I bless those under your watchful eye with the protection they need,” those words which he spoke came and went like the wind, roaring once before vanishing to never be spoken again. The only thing I knew was the distinct voice that entered my ears. Even as a spirit, he was as decrepit and elderly as I remembered.

I stared at him, the muscles in my eyes no longer straining, I was content to wait however long I needed to in order to receive an answer as to why this was happening. His movement merged with the water and the entirety of the wall beamed before the current emerged from its stasis and began to flow, seemingly no longer by the steady will of the raindrops, but instead by whatever madness that was taking place recklessly. With Loryn by my side, we followed it back through what felt like a labyrinth before we were back out where we came in. I squinted through the daylight—a harsh change from the dim and gloomy walkways of the pantheon.

The familiar faces I saw looked to me in expectancy, all asking the same silent question when a heavy mist peeled from the walls, accumulating all the nearby streams and beginning to rise around us. Comparable to the ferocity of a tornado, it was rapid in the blink of an eye and spitting powerful droplets onto the wall in every direction.

Silence.

I urged my eyelids open, and a field of grass spread across all of my vision. My movement was slow and cumbersome as I circled the area with my eyes. Everybody was positioned perfectly as if we were still in the pantheon entrance, but the expressions plastered on their pale faces were the same as mine. We were home, within reach of lushness and plentiful bounty. The snow was nowhere to be found, but a light drizzle held in the air and dappled my hands.