Welcome to Gaia! ::

Ereshkigal walked along the edge of the desert alone. Her family was some few miles away. Lately, she had felt the heaviness of their presence. Her father and mother were losing their way, she could see it in their eyes. Her siblings tormenting her with their heathenistic leanings. She felt a stranger amongst those who were supposed to know her best.

Innana was too free with her ways, too irreverent in her dealings. There were rules. The law is hard but it is the law. Her grandfather had told her that once, and somewhere deep inside her it stuck into her molding conscious. Now it was the driving force of her nature. The law was important, not to be flaunted and disobeyed.

She clung to that belief like she was drowning, trying to make sense of the passion and the anger that ran rampant through her body along with her racing mind. The law smoothed the chaos, made it easier for her to think. Ereshkigal had something to cling to and it kept her anchored.

The little shadow by her foot moved like flame or smoke. Nergal. He peeked around her foot with white pupil-less eyes. His body trembled almost in the way it moved. He did not speak but yet he told her things inside of her head. What he saw or what he thought of things. And the shadow butterflies would tell her things, whispers of what others said. Never had she doubted them or feared them. Never had she questioned the validity of them, but she kept them in her hair when others were around. No one needed to know her servants were there.

They were the only ones who understood her. They knew how her mind worked, knew that it only ran smooth with order and law. Without it, she was shambles--a shell of herself. The law gave her power.

She knew what to do and what not to do. She knew that good does not outweigh the bad. If a stallion is stolen from and then apologized to and his goods returned--the thief can be forgiven but the good would not undone the bad. The law would still be broken and when the law is broken there is punishment.

Good is rewarded with good and bad with bad, they were not mutually exclusive concepts. One could both be rewarded and chastised--the doing of good did not erase that need for punishment. But others did not see the law as she did, did not hold to it's sacredness.

Fools.

They feared judgment. They feared being held accountable for their infractions. But for all there comes a reckoning, a time to pay. There comes a moment for both reward and punishement, the weighing of a soul.

Ereshkigal looked at the mare a few feet away--her day of reckoning had come.

Nergal whispered and wavered beside her. The gentle flutter of shadow moths stirred strands of her hair. She heard there whispers in the dark, the things they told her. Secrets that only they had whispered and seen. She was the law. Black and white, there were no shades of grey and before her stood a mare that was accused of doing terrible things.

Accusations were not enough though. One's guilt or innocence were weighed by their actions--by their words. This little mare would give herself way under her gaze.

Ereshkigal stood there silent and immobile as she watched the mare. Few could remain unflinching beneath her gaze. She had learned it from her grandfather, that a cold stare would make people reveal themselves more than words. So Ereshkigal stood there, her eyes cold and hard.

She could see the unbending nature of the girl. She was standing firm, unwilling to move or run. It was either courage or cowardice. Ereshkigal tilted her head slightly at the question. What did she want? She wanted the truth. She wanted to know if what the shadows had whispered were things that had happened.

"I have come to judge you," her words echoed on the soft wind and carried.

She is guilty. Nergal whispered to her. His voice was soothing. There are things she will do.

But she could not judge for what one would do, but what one had done. She could stop the bad things or she could spare her. Which would be the better course? Honour and duty forbade it. She could not judge the future.

"You have killed," her voice was flat and cold, her eyes boring into the other mare's. But the mare was standing straighter, and her face glowed with something that Ereshkigal knew well--righteousness.

"What have you to say to those charges? How would you sway my judgement?" Nergal was flickering beside her, his shadows wavering in and out. The butterflies seemed to slow their wings to time with her heartbeat. The world was quiet, there was only sand and breathing.

She waited for the other mare to defend herself, to speak. To lie.

The night gathered around them and Ereshkigal felt the cold against her skin.

"The God of death?" The words came out before she intended to speak them. Did she mean her grandfather? He was a ferryman of souls. It was from him that she had received her duty. To serve and to judge.

Many gods? She served more than one, so perhaps not her grandfather. Or was she saying that there were many names for the God of death? That could be. She said that she served, she did not decide or rationalize or make the decision.

Ereshkigal was the hand of her grandfather, a hand of death. Did that mean that this girl would serve her too? Would she be an instrument that she could use as she judged the law? In front of her stood a lithe, inconspicuous mare that could serve as a severing sword. An instrument of divine right. Maybe an instrument that would be hers....She would hear what the mare had to say.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx


"I do."

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx