The Ennead Contest Entries

5- His Mother's Wish (Winner)

 Cold air pierced my skin. I rubbed my arms over my sleeves, boots sinking into the soft mud beneath my feet. I peered down the bank to the river. Foamy white rapids raged below, thundering and relentless—no place for the ritual. But this wasn't everything. I squinted my eyes, scanning the water along its opposite bank. It looked somewhat still. Or at least like the current was weaker. Calmer shallows just across from where I stood. My heart lifted, if only for a moment. This would be our goal.

I trudged back up the bank with heavy, squelching steps, returning to my son and the road.

"Did you see anything?"

I nodded and held my hand out. "Give it back."

He handed me the switch in his grasp. I pressed it to his back. "March."

He groaned. "But I'm tired."

"Quiet," I snapped. My hold tightened on the switch for a moment before I calmed myself. "You just had a rest."

"But it wasn't long enough."

"March."

He stomped his feet with every step. I commanded him to pick up the pace and he groaned louder. The foolish child wouldn't understand no matter how many times I explained it. Once he attained immortality he would never have need for rest again.

But as it was now the child needed more than words to motivate him. I pushed him with the switch again, hitting a little harder this time. The implication struck him and he sped up. I don't know how long we walked from this point—shrouded in twilight's grey—as telling time here was impossible; the living weren't meant to traverse the land of the dead. But eventually the river narrowed and a stone bridge spanned its width.

I urged my son forward onto the bridge, still sobbing his complaints. "Silence," I rasped, raising the switch above my head.

"But I need rest." His face had gone red and puffy.

I whacked him across the back of his shoulders. "Silence!"

He dropped to his knees and wailed.

My heart jumped in my chest. The ferryman had told me of dziwożona that lived in the River Styx. Wild women of the waters, he'd said. Monsters who stole children like my son straight out of a mother's arms. I knelt down—placed my hands gently over his shoulders. "Shush, child. Shh. We'll rest soon."

But his crying continued. He slammed his fists on the stone bridge. Grew louder the more I told him, "be calm," or "it's all right." Looking back, I see now why this temper was all he ever knew; it was all I'd ever taught him. But I also knew no other way, and so I grew frustrated with him as well.

I shook him. He wailed still, cutting in and out to the rhythm of my jostling. I slapped him across the face.

"Shut up."

I was quiet at first.

"Shut up!"

But I grew louder the more he cried. Soon I was shouting it. Shouting it over his wailing because I needed him to understand the danger without my having to find the words. Without my having to put in the effort.

And for this I was punished.

He was punished.

Water splashed below. Something wet slapped upon the bridge beside us. I turned. Before me on its hands and feet was a creature shaped like a woman. Bones poked up through a sheet of white flesh. Skin stretched thin and translucent over her form in all places but her breasts, sagging limp to drag on the ground. Straight black hair obscured her face, laced with reeds. Through the gaps in her bangs a pointed tongue hung from between a pair of icy blue lips, peeled back to bare two sharp rows of teeth.

My heart stopped. The dziwożona screamed and my blood ran cold. She lunged forward. I fell back, raising my arms over my face. But she didn't attack me. My son cried out to me as the monster took hold of him. She leaped over the parapet. I shot up and leaned over it. Both sank beneath the rapids. My eyes darted across the surface, waiting for them to rise. But they were gone. He was gone.

I fell to my knees, hot tears streaming down my face. My son. My only son. I'd only wanted the best for him. To make him invincible in these Stygian waters as Thetis had Achilles. And this was the cost for my hubris.

No. I refused. I wouldn't let this be the end. I would get him back. Had to.

I took the switch in hand and rose, crossing the bridge. Here I ran downstream beside the river. My every muscle wanted to explode into a sprint, but I subdued my mounting desperation—ran a paced run as Pheidippides did to inform the Athenians of their victory. As I would run to save my son.

A long time passed. I examined the banks of the Styx carefully, but not once did I stop. Not until finally I spotted something at the water's edge. I scrambled down the muddy slope to find myself at the backwater I'd observed before. Where I'd decided I would bathe my son.

Here, lying back in the shallows, was a child. Rather the travesty of a child. Its abdomen bulged huge from its body. Its head was small, with a wide brow and black eyes. It reached for me with emaciated arms, brandishing dark claws.

The changeling rose on two stick legs and began stumbling toward me. My hands shook—grip tightened on the switch. I looked up from it toward the river. I screamed at the dziwożona, knowing she would be nearby to laugh at her sick prank. "Give him back."

I raised the switch and brought it down over the changeling's head. It pulled back at the snap on its flesh—turned and huddled with its hands over its head. I whipped it again, across its hunched back. "Give him back." Again. "Give him back." Again. "Give." Whack. "Him." Whack. "Back."

The creature cried under the beating. It sounded just like him. Like my son. My vision blurred with tears. The words came quieter and quieter. The lashings softened until I couldn't bring myself to draw back again. My legs gave out from under me. I doubled over and sobbed into the mud.

Still the changeling wailed with agony. Its cries tore me apart inside. Made me hate myself for what I'd done—for who I was. This defenceless creature. But I couldn't take it. I needed it to stop. Needed silence. So I responded the only way I knew how.

"Shut up," I screamed into the earth. It continued to cry. I raised my head up. "Shut—"

I froze.

The dziwożona hunched over the changeling—embraced the crying creature. Without a glance my way she lifted the child in her arms and walked back to the water with it. Both sank beneath the surface and disappeared from sight.

I wiped my tears on my sleeve. She'd taken it back. That meant. . .

I turned my head side-to-side, frantically searching the water's edge. Then I found him, drifting through the backwater toward the bank. I rushed into the water, wading up to my waist by the time I caught him. I took my son in my arms, sobbing into his hair. "I'm sorry," I whispered over and over. "I'm so sorry."

He growled. Something guttural. Unnatural. I pulled back to gaze down at him. His skin was white and cold. His stomach bloated. Arms and legs thin as bone. His eyes black.

He tried to push away from me. I held tight. "It's me, my child. It's your mother."

He scratched at my neck with emerging nails. I lost hold of him. He thrashed in the water, unable to touch bottom. Began to drift away. I tried to grasp his ankle, but he kicked at my hand and slipped away—farther and farther away until the rapids swept him up again.

That was the last I saw of my son. I left for home alone after that. Tried to forget. But I can't. I know he's still out there. I know because he was bathed in the River Styx. Maybe by a better mother than I could ever hope to be. Bathed as Achilles—just as I'd wished for him.

Unwholesome and immortal.