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Wand of Sorcery
- Wand of Sorcery -
The moon is an uncanny thing they say, for it works with tides, seasons, and phases. And so the ancients feared the moon, in particular when it formed the crescent horns that the unenlightened called evil! Yet mankind too has its’ seasons and phases, and whilst human beings are born, live, and die… the moon looks down eternal. I have never once feared the moon, or the night. Rather, when it shines its’ radiance upon me, I bask in it like a fey queen basks in the serenity of a toadstool ring. The moon is a fair maiden to me, and she reminds me of my own fairness. Beauty calling to beauty, even when I fear and feel that I lack the beauty that I crave! It is the night so terrible, or the day so wonderful? Neither is fair or foul, save for what we do make of it. But some nights are hideous, and beget a primal fear that paralyzes reason and calls to the primal terror that the ancestors of man felt when they gazed from their fires into the darkness beyond. They feared the unknown, and so this tale is of the unknown… for it is a tale of fear and terror, though of beauty too. A strange kind of beauty, hypnotic and terrifying!
The summer waned, and autumn came with all its’ suddenness. Once here, it saw befall a singular evening when I walked in the darkened wood in search of some branch by which I might fashion a wand of magical properties. The midnight sky was spectral and otherworldly, and on my witches’ pilgrimage I strode past groves and gardens that were wild, and places that were abandoned by mankind… wild places, desolate places, where only ravens haunt. The flowers of the gardens were in the process of fading, no longer to give their honeyed scents and pretty colors, at least for the remainder of the year. A cycle of the seasons was getting ready to turn, and to turn again. There was in the rush of autumn, a certain narcotic joy in having to realize that you too are a part of the great turnings of hidden wheels. I felt such joy as I sought for the sacred branch, and it was a child’s joy, though I being a grown woman was not adverse to such bouts of childishness. My blonde hair shone in an almost silvery hue with the moonlight, and the foliage appeared strange along the eldritch trails my sandaled feet did tread. There was, I noticed, clear streams flowing, and an old wooden bridge that crossed it… or mayhap just some logs ever so idly placed. But by whom or what were they thus arranged, I did wonder! I crossed by that means, the babbling waters, and I could hear someplace far off… the sound of a solitary wolf mournfully calling to its’ kin. I knew that call, for had I not oft uttered the human equivalent in search of others like myself? On a whim, I cast a stone into the stream and watched as many myriad ripples formed… in each one, the face of the moon was reflected, albeit peculiarly. I caught a passing glimpse of my own face, equally pale and equally lovely. For an instant, my face and the moon’s were one, and in that illusion I was lost for the span of a moment and not more. I shook off the enchantment and walked along, putting the bridge and the stream far behind me. I could hear the sound of something behind me, but when I turned there was nothing there save for a man-sized shadow… though no man did cast it. I swallowed hard, fearing the worst, and I quickened my face… my feet crunching the autumn leaves beneath me as I padded along. This was not a peaceful forest where placid waters kindly nymphs might by chance play. This was a domain forsaken by the wise… even as I thought myself wiser than they. I feared to pay the price for my arrogance! A silence was upon the woodland, and the shafts of moonlight illuminated the shadow behind me darker. Could a shadow be illuminated at all? Yet did this one have a pale, green corpse-glow to it that was sickening to behold. It was a most uncanny form, and one not of this world. I sensed in it something ancient and hateful. So I began to run very fast.
I knew not whither I ran, nor for how long I did so… only that my arms brushed aside the branches of trees and thickets as I attempted to distance myself from whatever dark power it was that followed me. I reached into the pouch I wore at my belt, which cinched my black gown at my waist… and I produced a white lotus. I turned around and held it at arm’s length, expecting the inevitable encounter with darkness to begin. The shadow was there, just as I knew it would be. It came ever nearer, becoming more and more distinct as it did so. I could see within that black veil, the shape of a woman… a woman who was in the utmost agony. “Stay back, fell shade!” I intoned, and at the site of the white lotus the fiend-maiden made no attempt to draw any nearer to me. “Why do you fear me?” she wailed. “Why do all men and women fear me!” she wailed again. “Who are you?” I asked, and she replied: “All who live, know me. For at some point, we must meet… but once we meet, life is at an end. Surely you know me, solitary sorceress.” And I nodded in recognition, explaining: “Aye, I do know you. You are Death, are you not?” and the spectral maiden nodded her head in assent. “If you be Death, then why are you wailing, why do you seem in pain and torment? If this be my time to perish, then should you not be elated rather!” And the personification of death confessed unto me, saying: “I agonize, for you bear that hateful flower that keeps me from touching you and bestowing upon you my kiss! My kiss is beautiful, sorceress… so then why do you wish to stave it off? Let us now embrace, peacefully, before wolf or devil finds you in these darksome forested domains.” But my hand did not once drop the flower it bore. My strong right hand! My left clasped the ceremonial dagger at the ready. The dagger by which I could call out the five cardinal elements, that I might be protected by all spiritual harm. I traced the pentacle in the air before me, and Death could not cross beyond it. “It is not yet my time!” I exclaimed, and ran as if all of Hell were upon my bare heels.
After some time thusly fleeing the grim lady’s pursuit, I came to a terrible marsh where the lights of will o’ wisps could be seen, and in each one there was the face of person long dead. It was a place of horror, for over the centuries and far into the fading memory of antiquity… men and women had drowned in those marshes, sucked beneath bogs and pulled to a watery end whilst breathing poisonous and noxious fumes. I dared not enter that place, for therein did lay only a horrifying end. Yet I could hear the wailing of the grim one behind me, not far off. She had broken through my barrier, and even now sought to claim me for herself. If I could find the sacred branch I had come here for, then I knew she could not touch me before my allotted time upon this world was come. Yet, was it my quest for this artifact that brought me hither into her power, even so prematurely as this was for her to stalk me? I dared not speculate, but it was then that I did espy a stony path of cracked and broken cobbles, which led safely through the marsh. Seeking to outrun Death, I fled that way… and when I gazed back over my shoulder, the grim lady no longer pursued me. Mayhap she was certain of my doom now, so she needed not come to take me. Was I fleeing her only to place myself more surely into her clutches? All I knew is that for the moment I was safe and free of Death’s designs for me. The dead souls of the marsh held no power to harm the living, and still did I carry with me both white lotus and blessed blade. Before the passing of an hour, or so it seemed, I had reached the other side of the marsh, and before me loomed a broken foundation that once had been a dwelling of some kind. Who might have raised such a residence in such a place of old? One who surely must have wished to remain hidden… and hidden things have secrets. Secrets that wait to be discovered! I made my way into the ruins, and I saw there many piles of ash in which were mixed the bones of people who had burned with their dwelling. Why? I could not imagine, for their story was lost and the telling of it could never be recalled. Even here, this was the domain of Death! And I feared these old bones would call her hither, so I did depart from the ruins by woodland paths that seemed to wind on forever. Was my quest so urgent? I felt much doubt.
Terrified as much by what might lay before me, as by what I had left behind in my wake… I crossed dense brush and hard terrain that led to the foothills of a distant mountain. At the bottom skirts of the great mount, there lay a dreary pond… and on the pallid banks of that pond, there my eyes did behold the faerie ring in which sat the branch I had sought. I picked it up and did note the shaft of wood to be about the length of a human arm. At the end, there did three claw-like protrusions of wood emerge. I took some time to work in the moonlight, carving the bark from the wood and bathing the stripped branch in the waters of the pond. My sacred task was begun! I thence consecrated what would become my wand of sorcery, to the very Goddess whom I did serve. I placed in the claw of the wand a clear gemstone, bound in place with small black cords. I tied a yellow ribbon around the top of the wand, just beneath the claw, to symbolize light. And beneath that, a black and orange ribbon to symbolize darkness! I had labored upon the creation of this artifact for some time, and that was enough time for Death to catch up to me. All my materials I had brought with me in my pouch, but in work I had cast aside the most important of them… my white lotus. My dagger too lay discarded on the ground by the ring of toadstools from which I had retrieved the branch that was now a magical artifact of potent power. An artifact I held within my left hand. The grim lady strode before me, her hands outstretched. She had a beautiful smile upon her face. “Come to me now, sorceress! Let me grant you my peace now, and spare you the inevitable misery of age.” I was still young, so I feared not age or doom. I did hold my consecrated wand out before me, tracing the hexagram that is drawn with one unbroken line. “You seek to conjure what, sorceress? That is not a sign of protection, but one of conjuration!” I smiled, and replied to Death: “I know. Just as I know that there are powers in this universe far greater than you!” And I called to the Goddess to aid me, to send my most holy Guardian Angel to protect me and save me from Death’s embrace. And she came not from the stars, but from the very air around us… as if she had been there all along. The angel manifested as a tall, seven-foot blonde woman with green eyes and six raven-black wings. Those wings were covered in emerald green eyes! The angel was pale and lovely, with platinum blonde hair and an air of majesty like a queen. The angel put out her left hand to hold Death at bay, and with her right hand she motioned first to the sky and then to the earth. “As above, so below!” she intoned, in a voice that was a harmonious and perfect blend of male and female tones. “It is not the sorceress’ time to die.” She then calmly stated, and Death blushed, if such a colorless being could do so. She blushed, bowed her head before the divine will of the angel, and departed back into the shadows from whence she had come. “Collect your things, keep your wand close, and depart this domain of Death. I shall remain here for a time to purify the evil that is within the marsh.” That was all that the angel said to me after that, and I took her advice. I left that place by the way which I had come… remembering with great clarity the paths I had crossed and the things I had witnessed. I passed the marsh, the ruins, the dark heart of the woods, and the bridged stream… and finally I arrived in familiar places once again. I had won my wand of sorcery from Death herself… yet one day all must embrace her.
The moon is an uncanny thing they say, for it works with tides, seasons, and phases. And so the ancients feared the moon, in particular when it formed the crescent horns that the unenlightened called evil! Yet mankind too has its’ seasons and phases, and whilst human beings are born, live, and die… the moon looks down eternal. I have never once feared the moon, or the night. Rather, when it shines its’ radiance upon me, I bask in it like a fey queen basks in the serenity of a toadstool ring. The moon is a fair maiden to me, and she reminds me of my own fairness. Beauty calling to beauty, even when I fear and feel that I lack the beauty that I crave! It is the night so terrible, or the day so wonderful? Neither is fair or foul, save for what we do make of it. But some nights are hideous, and beget a primal fear that paralyzes reason and calls to the primal terror that the ancestors of man felt when they gazed from their fires into the darkness beyond. They feared the unknown, and so this tale is of the unknown… for it is a tale of fear and terror, though of beauty too. A strange kind of beauty, hypnotic and terrifying!
The summer waned, and autumn came with all its’ suddenness. Once here, it saw befall a singular evening when I walked in the darkened wood in search of some branch by which I might fashion a wand of magical properties. The midnight sky was spectral and otherworldly, and on my witches’ pilgrimage I strode past groves and gardens that were wild, and places that were abandoned by mankind… wild places, desolate places, where only ravens haunt. The flowers of the gardens were in the process of fading, no longer to give their honeyed scents and pretty colors, at least for the remainder of the year. A cycle of the seasons was getting ready to turn, and to turn again. There was in the rush of autumn, a certain narcotic joy in having to realize that you too are a part of the great turnings of hidden wheels. I felt such joy as I sought for the sacred branch, and it was a child’s joy, though I being a grown woman was not adverse to such bouts of childishness. My blonde hair shone in an almost silvery hue with the moonlight, and the foliage appeared strange along the eldritch trails my sandaled feet did tread. There was, I noticed, clear streams flowing, and an old wooden bridge that crossed it… or mayhap just some logs ever so idly placed. But by whom or what were they thus arranged, I did wonder! I crossed by that means, the babbling waters, and I could hear someplace far off… the sound of a solitary wolf mournfully calling to its’ kin. I knew that call, for had I not oft uttered the human equivalent in search of others like myself? On a whim, I cast a stone into the stream and watched as many myriad ripples formed… in each one, the face of the moon was reflected, albeit peculiarly. I caught a passing glimpse of my own face, equally pale and equally lovely. For an instant, my face and the moon’s were one, and in that illusion I was lost for the span of a moment and not more. I shook off the enchantment and walked along, putting the bridge and the stream far behind me. I could hear the sound of something behind me, but when I turned there was nothing there save for a man-sized shadow… though no man did cast it. I swallowed hard, fearing the worst, and I quickened my face… my feet crunching the autumn leaves beneath me as I padded along. This was not a peaceful forest where placid waters kindly nymphs might by chance play. This was a domain forsaken by the wise… even as I thought myself wiser than they. I feared to pay the price for my arrogance! A silence was upon the woodland, and the shafts of moonlight illuminated the shadow behind me darker. Could a shadow be illuminated at all? Yet did this one have a pale, green corpse-glow to it that was sickening to behold. It was a most uncanny form, and one not of this world. I sensed in it something ancient and hateful. So I began to run very fast.
I knew not whither I ran, nor for how long I did so… only that my arms brushed aside the branches of trees and thickets as I attempted to distance myself from whatever dark power it was that followed me. I reached into the pouch I wore at my belt, which cinched my black gown at my waist… and I produced a white lotus. I turned around and held it at arm’s length, expecting the inevitable encounter with darkness to begin. The shadow was there, just as I knew it would be. It came ever nearer, becoming more and more distinct as it did so. I could see within that black veil, the shape of a woman… a woman who was in the utmost agony. “Stay back, fell shade!” I intoned, and at the site of the white lotus the fiend-maiden made no attempt to draw any nearer to me. “Why do you fear me?” she wailed. “Why do all men and women fear me!” she wailed again. “Who are you?” I asked, and she replied: “All who live, know me. For at some point, we must meet… but once we meet, life is at an end. Surely you know me, solitary sorceress.” And I nodded in recognition, explaining: “Aye, I do know you. You are Death, are you not?” and the spectral maiden nodded her head in assent. “If you be Death, then why are you wailing, why do you seem in pain and torment? If this be my time to perish, then should you not be elated rather!” And the personification of death confessed unto me, saying: “I agonize, for you bear that hateful flower that keeps me from touching you and bestowing upon you my kiss! My kiss is beautiful, sorceress… so then why do you wish to stave it off? Let us now embrace, peacefully, before wolf or devil finds you in these darksome forested domains.” But my hand did not once drop the flower it bore. My strong right hand! My left clasped the ceremonial dagger at the ready. The dagger by which I could call out the five cardinal elements, that I might be protected by all spiritual harm. I traced the pentacle in the air before me, and Death could not cross beyond it. “It is not yet my time!” I exclaimed, and ran as if all of Hell were upon my bare heels.
After some time thusly fleeing the grim lady’s pursuit, I came to a terrible marsh where the lights of will o’ wisps could be seen, and in each one there was the face of person long dead. It was a place of horror, for over the centuries and far into the fading memory of antiquity… men and women had drowned in those marshes, sucked beneath bogs and pulled to a watery end whilst breathing poisonous and noxious fumes. I dared not enter that place, for therein did lay only a horrifying end. Yet I could hear the wailing of the grim one behind me, not far off. She had broken through my barrier, and even now sought to claim me for herself. If I could find the sacred branch I had come here for, then I knew she could not touch me before my allotted time upon this world was come. Yet, was it my quest for this artifact that brought me hither into her power, even so prematurely as this was for her to stalk me? I dared not speculate, but it was then that I did espy a stony path of cracked and broken cobbles, which led safely through the marsh. Seeking to outrun Death, I fled that way… and when I gazed back over my shoulder, the grim lady no longer pursued me. Mayhap she was certain of my doom now, so she needed not come to take me. Was I fleeing her only to place myself more surely into her clutches? All I knew is that for the moment I was safe and free of Death’s designs for me. The dead souls of the marsh held no power to harm the living, and still did I carry with me both white lotus and blessed blade. Before the passing of an hour, or so it seemed, I had reached the other side of the marsh, and before me loomed a broken foundation that once had been a dwelling of some kind. Who might have raised such a residence in such a place of old? One who surely must have wished to remain hidden… and hidden things have secrets. Secrets that wait to be discovered! I made my way into the ruins, and I saw there many piles of ash in which were mixed the bones of people who had burned with their dwelling. Why? I could not imagine, for their story was lost and the telling of it could never be recalled. Even here, this was the domain of Death! And I feared these old bones would call her hither, so I did depart from the ruins by woodland paths that seemed to wind on forever. Was my quest so urgent? I felt much doubt.
Terrified as much by what might lay before me, as by what I had left behind in my wake… I crossed dense brush and hard terrain that led to the foothills of a distant mountain. At the bottom skirts of the great mount, there lay a dreary pond… and on the pallid banks of that pond, there my eyes did behold the faerie ring in which sat the branch I had sought. I picked it up and did note the shaft of wood to be about the length of a human arm. At the end, there did three claw-like protrusions of wood emerge. I took some time to work in the moonlight, carving the bark from the wood and bathing the stripped branch in the waters of the pond. My sacred task was begun! I thence consecrated what would become my wand of sorcery, to the very Goddess whom I did serve. I placed in the claw of the wand a clear gemstone, bound in place with small black cords. I tied a yellow ribbon around the top of the wand, just beneath the claw, to symbolize light. And beneath that, a black and orange ribbon to symbolize darkness! I had labored upon the creation of this artifact for some time, and that was enough time for Death to catch up to me. All my materials I had brought with me in my pouch, but in work I had cast aside the most important of them… my white lotus. My dagger too lay discarded on the ground by the ring of toadstools from which I had retrieved the branch that was now a magical artifact of potent power. An artifact I held within my left hand. The grim lady strode before me, her hands outstretched. She had a beautiful smile upon her face. “Come to me now, sorceress! Let me grant you my peace now, and spare you the inevitable misery of age.” I was still young, so I feared not age or doom. I did hold my consecrated wand out before me, tracing the hexagram that is drawn with one unbroken line. “You seek to conjure what, sorceress? That is not a sign of protection, but one of conjuration!” I smiled, and replied to Death: “I know. Just as I know that there are powers in this universe far greater than you!” And I called to the Goddess to aid me, to send my most holy Guardian Angel to protect me and save me from Death’s embrace. And she came not from the stars, but from the very air around us… as if she had been there all along. The angel manifested as a tall, seven-foot blonde woman with green eyes and six raven-black wings. Those wings were covered in emerald green eyes! The angel was pale and lovely, with platinum blonde hair and an air of majesty like a queen. The angel put out her left hand to hold Death at bay, and with her right hand she motioned first to the sky and then to the earth. “As above, so below!” she intoned, in a voice that was a harmonious and perfect blend of male and female tones. “It is not the sorceress’ time to die.” She then calmly stated, and Death blushed, if such a colorless being could do so. She blushed, bowed her head before the divine will of the angel, and departed back into the shadows from whence she had come. “Collect your things, keep your wand close, and depart this domain of Death. I shall remain here for a time to purify the evil that is within the marsh.” That was all that the angel said to me after that, and I took her advice. I left that place by the way which I had come… remembering with great clarity the paths I had crossed and the things I had witnessed. I passed the marsh, the ruins, the dark heart of the woods, and the bridged stream… and finally I arrived in familiar places once again. I had won my wand of sorcery from Death herself… yet one day all must embrace her.
Published 9th Oct 2012
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9th Oct 2012 7:15am
if it should exist, if it should be held accountable: for what wand defies death; it comes for all at last. Alas for you and I, the cycle is all there is to traverse once again...
10th Oct 2012 6:08am
Indeed, there is no power that can defy the dark mistress in the end... for when she comes, there is no will that may deny her embrace. Death is both terrible when she cuts life short, and merciful when she brings an end to suffering. All there is… is to live life to the fullest and to face Death with no regrets when the time comes for life to end. And sometimes, as it has been for you and I... life begins anew, and old joys can be savored. :)
