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Still grass- too still, unmoving in the absence of wind. Anticlea tried to make it move by brushing her hand over the surface of the grey stalks, but they only moved back to their place.
It was an unyielding sort of grass, absent of golden grain in this dark cave, its charcoal surface rubbing off on whatever it touched. The air was suffocating, ashen and bare as the surrounding land. This invisible space only brought the waiting she’d left behind. Stuck in a state of unchange, lacking peace.
Squinting out over the sloping hills, spreading in the low light, she tried to make out the other shades, unrecognisable unless they were looking directly to your own eyes, jaw taught she still couldn’t know if she’d been joined by family yet.
Stepping delicately through the grasses to sandy banks, she sat beside the silent waters of the Acheron- raging for others, but muted for herself.
An absence of time allowed her legs to stay folded, tracing repeating patterns of fuzzy greyness before her while outside her son was on the final rows of his journey.
Shrouded in mist and cloud, Odysseus landed his ships upon the entryway to Hades, and he stood rigid while his shipmates trembled, holding his sacrifices. Those craggy cliffs, the invisible cave, an entrance to places no mortal belongs.
The trench was drawn, the barrier weakening in anticipation; Milk and honey, liberations poured; Mellow wine and water, mortal reminders; And glistening barley, golden grains floating over the mixture delicately.
Rock crumbled, pebbles falling to grass sounded as large as boulders crashing against each other. The thin veil threatened to snap. It was unclear whether the incomplete sacrifice was bringing life back to its surrounding grasses, or if the greyness that enveloped the isle seeped into its core.
Odysseus drew his blade, kneeling beside the offering. Whispers of promises filtered into the underworld's ears.
Dappled foggy light, came from behind Anticlea, the waters of Acheron glowing with a light she hadn't seen in what felt like centuries-
The sun , through all the layers of haze and rock, dawn had held the sun, and it’d peeked through her red fingers once again.
A new smell overtook the wastelands of death, sweet honeyed milk, and the tart red flavours of late-afternoon nectar, soon they themselves were coated in new flavours of iron.
Anticlea stood hearing the call, racing forward up the cavernous way toward the crumbling rock with new hope.
Clouded sunlight met her and the other shades. Shrieking for their chance at meeting this visitor, but when all had calmed, each shade passing before the trembling Odysseus, two remained before the man.
His sword stayed fast over the trench, a delightful offering swirling its golden boats.
Anticlea- … Her eyebrows furrowed, twisting feelings of relief and confusion riddled within her, drowning out the hope. She knew her son didn't belong in this place, not yet.
“I don’t understand,” her words were carried away on the cool breeze before they could reach Odysseus’s ears.
Her son looked between them both, sword still held with its long blade toward the sky. Ready to combat any shade in their audience who tried to access the sacrifice.
He swallowed nervously, unable to read his mother's lips, but his eyes recognised her all too well. She knew she looked those ten or so years older, despite not having aged since her arrival in this wicked, timeless place. Youth had slipped away from her warrior as well. He’d always be her warrior, her son, before all else.
Elphenor paced the inner ring of shades, waiting for a chance where Odysseus’s eyes may stumble upon him.
The sceptre of Tiresias drove into the earth impatiently, drawing him forward in unearthly tendrils. He kneeled opposite Odysseus for what felt like a long while.
The air here still hung with the stench of death, weighing heavy on all around- Yet the new freshness of it compared to the land below was staggering. The golden rays of sun peeking through the clouds for one last time, all the reminders of the mortal world that drew Anticlea to truly imagine her feet could dig into the dusty soil.
She kneeled as well, behind Tiresias so she could see her son close by. No words were spoken now. Odysseus held his sword firm in its place, blocking Tiresias from his voice.
Forgotten , she thought.
She’d been forgotten.
Not by all, my son can know my face even after years he’s been away . That longing, those memories replayed of young days spent in the woods, trying to introduce Odysseus to the way of the hunt. But with every bow crafted, every target hit, the young boy longed for a sword.
A decision loomed nearby.
Have I failed you?
Anticlea’s tired eyes trained on Odysseus while he tried to keep his own away.
She recalled how he watched the older men train with their swords, how he followed their movements with a stick in hand, teaching the other children the way to fight.
She saw him past his war, past his training-
His spark of courage, the cleverness that saved him and his men time and time again. She saw him through to that childs core, the curiosity, the hunt, the warrior, the child who picked up the other children from a good fight and taught them to better their stance and strategy in their war-games.
He whose kindness held together those around him to continue onward to their goal.
He’d come so far from those days.
Now he looked broken.
I have failed you.
Then-
I am proud of you.
Odysseus sighed, “Tiresias,” he motioned for the prophet to leave.
Tiresias obliged, confused, and stood by. Elphenor approached the prophet quickly, asking a barrage of his own questions. Why hadn’t Odysseus yet recognised his presence? Why why why- so many questions.
Anticlea looked back to Odysseus and moved forward to the sacrificial trench. He moved his sword to the side.
She shook her head, knowing his journey would end. Last she’d been alive, his wife was still waiting, her own husband- his father, was waiting. Ithaca itself was waiting, stuck in a limbo to last a lifetime. To last Odysseus’s lifetime. His son, Telemachus… Too many were waiting for him there on native lands.
“Drink,” Odysseus prompted.
Anticlea was conflicted, she’d love to speak to her son again, but a part of her knew his mortality would bring them together once more, that she should wait and force the prophet to take the sacrifice instead. For Odysseus’s own good-
But what about her own good? She wanted to speak to her son, she wanted to tell him to continue, to not give up. She wanted to remind him of that child she’d raised.
Odysseus spoke once more, in a hushed whisper now, “ Please .”
Anticlea could see his own tired eyes brimming with tears. She leant down, fingers unable to feel the earth, and drank from the trench, feeling all to physical from the mixture running down her chin. It disappeared as she raised herself back upright, the sacrifice draining into the earth as if it’d never been there to begin with.
Tears streamed down his face now,
“And so I fail, to see a love long lost to me.
Before my eyes I see the unreal, strength lost to you, yet the tears you let fall are of the same nature as my own.”
Odysseus’s voice broke, but he hid it beneath a heavy-hearted pause.
“Is the mother I see before me the same I’ve known to bear me? Is she the one who’s taught me this longing for native land?
O’ Ithaca… What have I lost now?
All hope is lost, for I’ve given in to the temptations of comfort that once held me safely away from bloody war.”
“My warrior, my son, my Odysseus,” Anticlea reached forward, but her hands could not hold her son.
“As much as it pains me to see you again, you’ve cured the grief which sent my soul flying down to this place from the wrists.
But you must continue, for your wife, your son, your father. For Ithaca .
I do not know how you’ll depart once more without the help of Tiresias, who you’ve come to collect the truth from.
One day I know we’ll meet again, what I’d imagined would wait for me is now a death of waiting for you instead.
You have not failed me, I am here.”
Anticlea knew deep down that Odysseus wouldn't return home for a long time, if ever. And it’d be even longer for him to return to this place in the underworld.
She may not have belonged here either. Oh, how she wished she could go back knowing he’d return to Ithaca some sunny day. So that she could wait by the shore for his ship to grow large on the horizon.
It’d hurt to let him go again, she knew.
Odysseus shoved his silver-studded sword back to its sheath, busying his hands in blinding grief. His entire being shuddered as he spoke, hugging himself like he was once again that child Anticlea had known.
“My teacher, my mother, my Anticlea,
Tell me of Ithaca, tell me how I’m meant to continue
Tiresias shan’t speak to me now that the offering has been misgiven.”
Tiresias, hearing his name returned, looking down into the dry trench- He took his sceptre and set it into the dry earth, tapping on it as if the sacrifice may return. Instead, he began to speak- not to Odysseus, but to Anticlea.
Through Anticlea, Odysseus received his prophesy and instructions- to curb desire and leave the cattle of Helios alone, to sacrifice once again to Poseidon once he’d reached Ithacas shores. Through Anticlea, Elphenor spoke his pleas to be given a proper burial on return to Circe's island.
Between each shade who spoke to Odysseus, Anticlea recounted part of a story to Odysseus, a long-forgotten memory of her days hunting as one of Athena's women.
Tears broke away to pained smiles, and Anticleas words began to melt away once more, the stony veil dragging the shades back below as it repaired the break.
She’d have to let go of him again soon, without having been able to hold him in her arms once more. She’d have to go back to that painful darkness, those waiting days. Not knowing if she’d been able to aid Odysseus in his return. Unknowing of the happenings of the mortal world.
A mother's love was strong though, and she’d have a life's worth of stories to listen to when he finally arrived for good. She’d wait those unhappy years for him to have a chance for happy ones.
“You’ve become the hunter I’ve always dreamed you’ve become.
A hunter of men, a hunter of stories.
Your sword rivaled only by your mind.
You shoot with accuracy contesting my own, arrows of cunning victory in your quiver.
You were never a poet, only a fighter. Yet I now see how your sharp words and strategy were your path toward every glory you’ve earned.
Do not cry for fallen men- For what good does grieving do? We all await those we love, there’s no hurry, no glory better to achieve than a loving home.”
She stood and turned back toward the underworld, leaving her son once again.
“I live on through your story; Though you, I am not famous, but I am not forgotten.”