He stepped out of the shadows and walked towards me. Never before has he been so close to me, not even in my childhood. I was so scared that, when I wanted to scream, my voice wouldn’t leave my throat. It was only me and him, in that dark forest. He was getting closer by the second.
I wanted to run, but my body would deny receiving any command I gave it, so I was simply paralysed, frozen in place.
I heard him whisper something in a foreign, yet familiar language that I’ve only heard a couple of times in my whole few good hundreds years of life. It sounded like something ancient, sacred even. After saying this bizarre phrase, he took a step back and watched his work with admiration: leaves started floating everywhere, circling me; and the usual sound of leaves rustling slowly metamorphosed into a whisper which clearly resembled that eerie phrase.
I tried to step out of the circle, but the leaves drew closer to me, tightening like a wall; and strong trees started growing out of nowhere and everything around me became a cage. The leaves, the trees, the air…
“You can have a part of my powers if you join me and help me”, said to me the horned, shadowy figure, in a raspy, deep voice, smiling crazily.
I let my gaze fall on him, we locked our eyes and he must have read the terror in mine, as his smile widened. I was terrified thinking what would happen next and…
That’s when my alarm went off and I woke up, all sweaty and gasping for air. I walked to the mirror and checked myself out. I was still whole and human. I let a sigh of relief escape my lips.
I only noticed the green leaf in front of the huge mirror when I came back home, after a harder than usual day of work. There was a small picture of me braiding my hair, with that leaf in it, stuck to the top right corner of the mirror. So I assumed that it must have remained in my hair after the previous night’s show and it fell on the floor when I was doing my hair.
Trying to control my breath and keep my hands from shaking, I slowly bent down and picked up the leaf.
On its back, there were some golden, tiny letters, which were vanishing as I read them:
‘What kind of cage would you prefer? The one that human society puts you in each and every second of your miserable, unworthy co-existence with them? Or the one that you visited last night? Please come home, Ammit, if you have had enough of the Earth. You can find better “food” for yourself here. ‘
(Greetings from Below,
Your Papa)
At least he wasn’t that mad at me, which made me relax. I rolled my eyes, since I hated it when he was right. Yeah, Earth was fun ‘n’ stuff, but the better “food” was home.
So, being grateful that, unlike ordinary plain humans, I had a choice, I stepped inside the mirror, unravelling my black wings and letting out my horns again. It felt good to be yourself. And it looked good, too.
Feeling like I’ve caused enough bad things on Earth (and knowing that Papa could safely handle the rest), I headed home.
Moral of the story: nowhere is better than home… even though you cone from Hell’s deepest dungeons.
Note: Ammit is an ancient Demoness name and it means “Soul Eater”.
Patry's Writings 